Examples Of Irony In Lamb To The Slaughter

In “A Jury of Her Peers” Glaspeel introduces the main characters Mrs.Hale and Mrs.Peters along with their husbands Mr.Hale and Mr.Peter. Nowhere in this story do the people involved in the murder appear, they are only mentioned. In this story, Minnie Wright is the wife of the victim Mr.Wright. The scene Glaspell sets enables the reader to uncover the motive for the murder when the women discover the birdcage and the dead bird. These small details are interpreted by the woman, noticing frustration in Mrs. Wright's most recent stitches and her dead pet bird.

Peters and Mrs. Hale are the ones who find clues to solving the murder. Glaspell foreshadows this outcome by having the county attorney say “‘…[n]o telling; you women might come upon a clue to the motive…’” (Glaspell). Once the men leave the women alone they begin putting together items to take to Mrs. Wright in jail and no one is concerned with what they are taking her because the men do not see anything from the domestic realm to be dangerous. While they are putting together items, Mrs. Peters stumbles upon a birdcage that has clearly been roughed up, and eventually they locate a deceased bird.

In “Jury of Her Peers” by Susan Glaspell, Mrs. Wright is accused of murdering her husband. While the sheriff, Mr. Peters, is having difficulty finding the motive. On the other hand, Mrs. Hale and the sheriff’s wife, Mrs. Peters, discover three significant clues in their ability to relate to Mrs. Wright. Although Mrs. Wright claims to have been asleep during her husband’s murder, the women conclude she strangled her husband, Mr. Wright, as evidenced by the errant quilt patch, broken birdcage, and slaughtered canary.

“A Jury of Her Peers”, written by Susan Glaspell, tells the story of the murder of Mr. Wright and its criminal investigation by Mr. Peters, the town sheriff, and the county attorney. In this short story, Glaspell illustrates how the female perspective is shackled by traditional gender roles, leaving their voices unheard and household abuse. This is depicted by Mrs. Wright, who murders her husband due to the abuse she experienced, and Mrs. Peters, who notices details that the men overlook, in turn cracking the case. In this story, Mrs. Wright has a pet canary that her husband kills. Glaspell's description of the canary symbolizes Minnie Wright’s character and role as a household woman in a male-dominated society.

As the two women are tidying up the house, Mrs. Peters discovers an empty birdcage. The two women continue their work throughout the house, but upon closer inspection Mrs. Peter finds that the door of the birdcage is broken. This specific incident makes the women grow suspicious of what may have happened to the bird that was in it. Upon further research, John Wright’s neighbor explained that John was a “hard man,” and that he was also “like a raw wind that gets to the bone” (555). This description of John Wright shows the aggressive and harsh side of Mr. Wright that not a lot of people may necessarily know about him besides people who live with him or live in close proximity to him.

A dead bird, a dead man, a jailed wife, and five people to investigate such things. In “A Jury of Her Peers” in order to find the guilty culprit, there was a need to find a motive. The men would spend all day searching for the reason someone would murder the Mr. Wright, and so would the women. When the women finally did find a motive, they would hide it from the men. They had the right to do so because they themselves had felt the same way Mrs. Wright did, the men were being disrespectful, and the women were dismissed from the men’s sides to look upon things with no significance.

Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters are hiding the main evidence from the Sheriff and county attorney; for instance, the canary. Without this key evidence they will have no reason to blame Mrs. Wright for her husband's death. At this point in the passage, the women are still in the kitchen conversing, while the men are going all over the house looking for clues, only to see the already discovered body. The women are not sure what to do with Mrs. Wright’s bird, but they now know that Mrs. Wright did in fact kill her husband. “Martha Hale snatched the box from the sheriff's wife, and got it in the pocket of her big coat just as the sheriff and the county attorney came back into the kitchen.”

In “A Jury of Her Peers” by Susan Glaspell, the sheriff, Mr. Peters, is struggling to find a motive for Mr. Wright’s murder case due to his sexist views. However, Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters, the sheriff’s wife, are able to find significant clues that lead to Mrs. Wright’s motive because they relate to her living conditions. Although Mrs. Wright claims to have been asleep during her husband’s murder, the women conclude she strangled her husband, Mr. Wright, as evidenced by the slaughtered canary, the broken bird cage, and the errant quilt patch. The slaughtered canary wrapped in silk is a significant clue, which leads to Mrs. Wright’s motive.

The dead canary and its cage was a pivotal piece of evidence that the women discovered. The dead bird represents the old Mrs. Wright— Minnie Foster and its cage represents how she was

Wright killed the canary and is also motive for Mrs. Wright to seek revenge. The women conclude that Mrs. Wright’s bird was her prized possession, the bird even reminds the women of Mrs. Wright, “‘She—come to think of it, she was kind of like a bird herself. Real sweet and pretty, but kind of timid and—fluttery. How—she—did—change.’”

A prominent piece of evidence that was found in the house was a broken bird cage and the question lies within what her personal interpretation of this object was. With a solemn tone, Martha replied, “I believe Minnie’s husband ripped the cage door open when in a rage and snapped the bird’s neck, so she did the same to him.” It is hard to believe that one’s emotions could so greatly influence their actions but in this case, it seems as if the Wright’s were involved in an unhappy, abusive marriage. To connect back to the bird queries, I also asked Mrs. Hale what she did with the deceased creature that Minnie Wright held so dearly. Martha without hesitation mentioned that she “grabbed it without a second thought” and that she wishes to bury it because Minnie would have wanted that.

The scene begins to unfolds in their minds. Mr. Wright yanking open the cage door, taking out the bird, and breaking its fragile neck was enough to make Mrs. Wright lash out, and in a heat of passion, kill her husband. As the trifles collect,  the women worry that the men will see their findings, and have what they need to prove Mrs. Wright guilty. Though the men believe her to be the murderer, the women are trying their best to hide the evidence that will prove it.

The men of the group, much like John in “The Yellow Wallpaper,” consider themselves more capable than the women and refuse to consider Mrs. Wright as anything other than irrational. The men leave the women to their “trifles” on the first floor, where they discover a broken bird cage, and the bird’s body, broken, carefully wrapped in a small, decorative box. They realize that Mr. Wright had wrung the neck of his wife’s beloved bird and broken its cage. Mrs. Wright, once known for her cheerfulness and beautiful singing, she stopped singing when she encountered Mr. Wright. Just like he did with the bird, Mr. Wright choked the life out of his wife until, finally, Mrs. Wright literally choked the life out of her husband.

In Susan Glaspell's play “Trifles,” there is a difference between the men and women’s way of perceiving evidence to Mr. Wright’s murder case. The men spend most of their time searching for solid evidence upstairs where Mr. Wright's murder takes place. However, the women spend most of their time in Mrs. Wright’s kitchen. Instead of seeking tangible evidence, they inspect the condition of the items and acknowledge how they have been muddled around. Different perspectives lead to a variety of discoveries such as the women’s way of perceiving evidence.

Wright it is easy to tell that she is not at all upset about her husband’s death. When being asked about the situation she “laughed and pleated her skirt” (4). Mrs. Wright is compared to a bird that is found later in the story. The bird was found in a pretty box with marks around its neck. Hale and Peters say that the death of her bird would have been her motive if she actually was her husband’s murderer, but the author utilizes the bird and its broken cage to be a comparison to Mrs. Wright’s life.